Often when an actor does press for one project, there's really another big project that people really want to hear about. Harrison Ford's last several movies were sort of excuses to get scoops on Indy IV. Zachary Quinto is in the rare position to have two equally anticipated projects. Trekkies and general sci-fi fans want to see his take on the young Spock in J.J. Abrams' new Star Trek, but also want to know what's up with Sylar in the new season of Heroes.

Spock is an icon dating back to the '60s and Sylar has certainly earned a place in modern pop culture. Quinto could have two defining roles on his hands, one hero and one villain.

"I think there are elements of the characters that echo each other but I think they echo each other from very different, opposite ends of the spectrum," notes Quinto. "Each of the characters employs a stillness and a rich internal point of view that informs the way that they behave and the way that they relate to people around them. It's great fun to have characters that are rich and that are full of challenges and full of rewards. Both of these characters are clearly that. So as an actor, I don't really approach a character as to whether or not it's good or bad. I just approach a character as to where it lives in me. I think for numerous reasons both of these very different characters both find life in me."

Both Heroes and Star Trek plotlines are closely guarded secrets, yet Quinto found ways to analyze each without giving away spoilers, though fans will have to wait until May 2009 to find out exactly how Spock met Kirk and beamed aboard the Enterprise.

Question: How do you think you look in Vulcan ears?

Zachary Quinto: You know what? I feel like it pulled together really well. The makeup and hair department on the movie did a phenomenal job so I'm really excited to see that put together.

Q: What was the first day on the set of Star Trek like knowing the history of that and getting to be a part of that?

ZQ: The experience evolved for me in so many different phases and each one of them is it's own unique lessons and it's own unique challenges and they're very common sort of rewards so I'm very grateful for all of it and I'm really excited to see where it leads me from here.

Q: What advice did Leonard Nimoy give you about playing Spock?

ZQ: I think getting to know him was one of the greatest honors of this experience. Having him involved and having him available and supportive was great. I have the utmost respect for him as a person. I feel really so honored to know him. We had many conversations and he's given me not just one nugget of advice, but it's been the unfolding of a friendship and a support system. That's really how I feel about it.

Q: Did he specifically influence your performance?

ZQ: I really felt like my relationship to the character was specific to the text that I was playing and to the world in which the character is being created right now, this time. I didn't feel beholden to Leonard other than the origins of what he created obviously, but I think the whole project was based in that philosophy. So it wasn't a problem.

Q: J.J. commented about what a great job you did on Star Trek, adding things he didn't even notice until post-production. Do you know what he was referring to?

ZQ: I think as an actor we're sort of oriented towards our character's journey. As a director you're looking at the whole picture and so in a lot of ways my relationship to the character was more specific on a day to day basis than his was and now his is more specific since he's in the editing room looking at it and piecing it all together. So I think that's sort of where that line is.

Q: What's been your career plan? Did you plan to use Heroes to get movie roles, and how did you choose Star Trek as your first hiatus movie project?

ZQ: Well, I hardly chose it, so to speak. This whole year for me has been such a blur of good fortune that very little of it was by design. I feel like my experience on Heroes and the world in which it's rooted lends itself to the attention that led me to be a part of the movie. I don't really think of it in terms of how I'll use Heroes to get movie roles or how I use Heroes to get other jobs. I remain as grateful to be on Heroes now as I did when I first started. It's so fulfilling creatively and professionally that I feel like you can't get ahead of yourself, because no amount of success or exposure, or opportunity is going to really matter or be ultimately fulfilling unless you can be totally present in what you're doing right now. That's sort of the way that I've gone from one thing to another. The timing of the fact that the movie happened during the strike and there were so many sort of fortuitous elements that lined up almost in a magical way. You could never even being to conceive of that unless it was happening to you, you know. So I feel like I couldn't be in a better spot. I couldn't be happier to be where I am and I have faith in the fact that that alone will lead me to whatever the next experience I'm meant to have is.

Q: Was it a relief to get back to that kind of freedom, of sort of letting loose with Sylar after Spock?

ZQ: I think that's the thing. That's kind of one of the similarities. Both these characters are very contained and very controlled. So letting loose in the sense of engaging in or indulging in these sort of instincts or impulses to murder and let loose in a violent kind of way, for me it was more like coming home when we came back to work on the show after going away on a new and uncharted excursion, with the movie and the sort of scale and size of the franchise and iconic nature of the character that I was stepping into. There was a tremendous sense of completion when I finished the film and a tremendous sense of familiarity when I came back to work on the show.

Q: When you signed on as Sylar, did you have any way of knowing how big this character would turn out to be, how the viewers would just love and hate him the way they do?

ZQ: Absolutely not. I don't think there's any way to sort of predict as powerful as this show has been for all of us involved and then for our audience. When you get involved in it, it's something that sort of takes you by storm a little bit. This is obviously the biggest example in my experience of that happening. But yeah, there's really no way to predict it and obviously I'm most grateful that it did, but had no way of telling when I signed on.

Q: How do you feel your theater training helps your performance as Sylar and with other roles?

ZQ: Well actually I'm really grateful to come from a theater background because it's sort of solidified my relationship to the work from a little bit of a different perspective than you see in Los Angeles sometimes. I mean, there are a lot of actors and sort of more and more actors I think that come from a theater background. So many of my friends actually working in Los Angeles now got those jobs that brought them to LA in New York.

For me personally, I feel like my training allows me to look at things from more than one perspective. It allows me to have a little bit more of an oversight and understand where a character lives in my body and understand where a character lives in my voice. Then you sort of modify those understandings to fit the format that you're working in.

I remember when I was in school that teachers would always sort of constantly argue about whether there was a different technique applied to television and film than is applied to theater. I think there definitely is, and I think that coming from a theater background allows me to sort of bring things down. Like rather than going from a small/medium to a large venue, it's much easier if you can fill a 700-seat theater. It's much easier to fill a 34-inch proscenium or whatever the size of the screen is that you're working on. So for me that training gave me a really great basis from which to work and I continue to learn about the technique and the tools that are necessary to work in television and film. I feel really fortunate to continue to have the experiences that teach me those new lessons.

Q: Did you always think that you would have a place in kind of the sci-fi movie-making and TV shows or was this just something that came about?

ZQ: Yeah, I never imagined that my experience would lead me so deeply into the comic book and science fiction world as it has. But again it's something that I'm incredibly grateful for. I think sort of harkening back to the question that was asked earlier about my training, it makes sense when you look at it from that perspective because I think there's something very theatrical about those worlds.

Obviously, the world of Heroes is incredibly heightened and there's something very theatrical about it. So while I never really expected it, it doesn't necessarily surprise me now that I'm ensconced in it. It's a really exciting group of fans and so I feel like that's something else that is an added bonus to the whole thing. It's probably the most ardent group of people that you could ever be working for in terms of fans and their enthusiasm for the stories that you're telling. So I'm happy to be here. Now that I am, it's definitely something that I definitely look forward to sort of exploring other areas of storytelling. But I'm so grateful that this one has brought me to a point where I'll be able to do that.

Q: In the new season of Heroes, how have you seen Sylar further grow and develop?

ZQ: Well, this is the longest time I've ever spent playing one character on a show and I think there are unique challenges that come along with that; the idea of just being on a show and playing a character in an open ended kind of way, especially in the serialized nature of the way that we tell our stories. So for me, this character grows and evolves in so many ways this season. I mean, primarily I think he's put in situations and he is, I think in some ways, manipulated to employ a kind of restraint against his instincts and his impulses that we've never seen him have to employ before. That's really been a fascinating journey for me and also equally challenging. When you come to settle into a character and there are certain aspects of this character in particular that people respond to and people come to sort of expect.

There's a lot of unexpected turns this year for my character and every time I open a script there's just a different kind of challenge, whether it's a physical challenge in terms of a fight sequence or a stunt sequence that we're doing, or a special effects sequence that we're doing, or emotional challenge in terms of what he's coming up against in himself, and what he's coming up against outside of himself with the people that he's interacting with. I think the tapestry of that has been incredibly rich this year for my character, in particular. So it's been a ride for sure.